Shadows of Chaos
by midnightluck
Summary: Very Special Agent Tony DiNozzo is also Anthony, Prince of Amber and Duke of the Far Reaches, and it really isn't that much of a problem.


_All recognizable characters belong to their respective owners (Roger Zelazney, Donald Bellisario/Don McGill, Jim Henson).  
_  
_Playing fast and loose with timelines, here, but it should still make sense. I hope. This should be accessible to people with knowledge of only one canon, but if you haven't read the Chronicles of Amber, I envy you the journey._

* * *

"Gear up," Gibbs said. "Dead Marine."

"Yay," Tony muttered, but grabbed his pack. So far, so normal.

Then they arrived, and things got considerably less normal.

"Was he _eaten_?" Tim asked.

Tony nodded agreement. "That's just not right."

But for all the tooth and claw marks, there were no tracks, no fur, no stool or anything to suggest an animal had been there. Just a single set of footprints leading from the forest up to the victim's location.

"He was running," Ziva observed from the length of the strides. "But what was he running from?"

"Maybe he turned into a werewolf, freaked out and ran, then mauled himself to death?" Tony suggested.

Everyone turned to look at him.

"What?" he asked defensively. "It could happen."

"In your dreams," Tim muttered.

"And on Rhapsacore," Tony added.

Tim's brow furrowed. "I don't know that one," he admitted after a second of thought. "What movie is that from?"

"Poor McGeek doesn't know pop culture," Tony singsonged, mostly as a distraction. Rhapsacore was a shadow far from here, not a movie at all. "I thought you'd know all about werewolves and stuff, but I guess you don't, huh?"

"Yes I do!" Tim objected, and Tony smiled smugly. Tim stopped, figured out what he'd just admitted to, and turned a dull red.

That would _never _get old.

Then Gibbs came over, so they got back to work, Tim doing the sketches and Tony taking pictures. When Ducky finally arrived trailing a flustered Jimmy, the whole scene had been documented.

"Time of death?" Gibbs asked.

"Oh, about...three o'clock last night," Ducky answered, pulling his thermometer free. "The witching hour," he told Jimmy. "Because it's—"

"—when the most people die and the most babies are born, right?" Jimmy finished, excited to know something.

Ducky frowned at his assistant for jumping the gun, but said, "Well, yes. Cause of death looks to be animal attack. Here, help me get him up on the stretcher."

Once the corpse was loaded into the back of the van, Gibbs got in his car and followed, leaving the other three to ride in the van.

"I'm telling Abby it was a werewolf," Tony announced as soon as the doors closed.

"Please don't," Tim groaned. "She'll never let it go."

"I know," Tony said smugly. "Why do you think I'm gonna tell her that?"

Ziva shook her head. "You are incorrigible," she said.

Tony beamed. "Thank you!"

Tim sighed.

Then something tugged at Tony, nudging at his mind, and he shivered. It had been ages since anyone tried to contact him by Trump, and anyone he actually wanted to hear from would know to use a phone. So he pulled out his own mobile as camouflage, held it to his ear, and said, "Hello?"

The face that shimmered into being was familiar, and not as unwelcome as he'd expected.

"Mother," he greeted. "What a surprise."

Florimel arched a brow at her wayward child. "But not a pleasant one?"

"Hardly unpleasant," he responded in kind. "I am a bit busy, though."

"I'm sure," she said, and her eyes sparkled. "Still playing around on that Earth?"

"You know I am, Mother. What is it?"

She sighed. "I _am _sorry to bother you, but you really need to know." She paused, and he knew, he just _knew_ this was gonna suck. "Corwin's escaped."

Oh, damn it all.

"Right," he said through numb lips. "How long ago?"

She bit her lip for a split second before she realized what she was doing and smoothed the tell away. "About a year, Amber time."

Damn it _twice_.

"And what's the bad news?" he asked, because if she hadn't told him about this before, there must be a reason that she was telling him now.

"There's unrest in the shadows," she said. "There are rumors that Corwin's talked Bleys into helping him, and they're raising an army to march on the citadel. I'm staying the hell out of it, and you should, too."

They likely wouldn't come to him for aid, but still. "Thanks for the warning," Tony said, and sighed. "So, situation normal, then?"

"Absolutely," she replied, "and be careful. Something's stirring, and it stinks of Chaos." Tony sighed, and she smiled. "And when this is all settled, do come home, dear. We miss you around here."

"Not likely," he said, and caught Ziva's look. "If there's nothing else...?"

"Be careful," she said earnestly. "And call for help if you need it."

"Yeah, sure," he promised without meaning it, and Flora waved her hand over her card, shutting off the connection. Tony pulled the phone away from his ear, pushed the hang-up button for verisimilitude, and stared down at it.

"Family troubles?" Tim asked.

Tony finally tucked the phone away, smiling grimly. His uncles must be twitchy, Corwin was running loose, shadows were stirring and Eric's crown was apparently nowhere near as solid as they'd thought. "I'm starting to remember why I disowned them."

* * *

_She'd spent years on this shadow, following Eric's orders to watch over an amnesiac Corwin. Decades, centuries, it had all passed by in a blink, because time to her was not time to this world. Suffice it to say, she'd been here a while, and she'd been lonely._

_So when she found this guy, who was young and handsome and charming, she took him up on his offer of dinner. He wasn't perfect, and he wasn't as much of a hero as he thought he was, but he was a gentleman, and he reminded her so much of her best-liked brothers. What it said about her that she let him kiss her, she neither knew nor cared._

_Years have always passed quickly in hindsight, so when she woke up one morning with a ring on her finger and a swollen stomach, she wondered quite how she had gotten here. Her new husband wasn't a knight (and she would know), but he showered her with affection and love, and she was desperate enough to take it._

_She'd been on this shadow for decades, now, and it was _lonely_._

_Lonely enough to put up with morning sickness and beeping machines and scanners that made no sense. But he was there for her, and she put on a smile and grabbed the rails of the bed and breathe-breathe-breathe _pushed_._

_It hurt, like she knew it would. Still, she'd had worse, so she gritted her teeth and blamed him loudly and dug through it and out the other side. And then, when they gently handed her a little bundle, she thought for a split-second that it was so, so worth it._

_And then she realized that she had brought life. She had borne a child, and he was of Amber blood in this time of contention and strife, and this being grew inside her stomach, and she took a deep breath and flipped right the fuck out._

_She had a son. She had a husband. She had a husband and a son and a family. She wasn't sure she could be a wife, or a mother. She wasn't sure she could handle being a part of a family again. Or ever._

_She had a family now, though, and responsibilities._

_Her son murmured in her arms, and twisted a bit, settling in like he wanted to be there. She considered just running, but this was her son. Her baby. He was ugly, as all babies were, squinched and tiny and red and blotchy, wrinkly and smelly and loud. He was awkward to hold, or maybe it was her that was awkward holding him, and for some reason the thought of putting him down or letting the nurses take him made her heart hammer and her breath catch and her arms squeeze a little tighter around him._

_She was Florimel, Princess of the House of Amber, and he was her son, a Prince of Amber. None would harm him, none would separate them, and none would threaten their peace and happiness. Which meant keeping him here, on this shadow, at least until the matter of succession was resolved. It meant hiding and lying and trusting no one._

_Good thing she was good at that._

* * *

"A wolf," Tony said skeptically. "You're serious? A _wolf_?" For all he'd joked about a werewolf, he'd really thought it was just some rabid dog.

"That seems to be what the report indicates, yes," Ducky said, frowning over the pieces of paper in question.

"Our guy was savaged by an impossibly-sized wolf that doesn't leave tracks. In downtown DC," Tony repeated for clarity's sake.

"Yes, Anthony," Ducky sighed. "That's what it looks like."

Tony barely twitched at his full name; he was almost used to Ducky using it. "Right," he said, "Great. I'll just go tell Gibbs that we've lost jurisdiction to Animal Control. Yeah, he'll appreciate that."

Then he took a deep breath, and exhaled slowly, because he hadn't meant to get mad. They wouldn't lose jurisdiction or anything, seriously, that was a disproportionate response. "Sorry," he muttered, looking down. He shouldn't be taking his frustrations out on the coroner; it wasn't his fault Tony was twitchy today. "Thanks, Ducky," he added, because hey, a lead was a lead, even when the lead was a wolf.

"Is everything all right?" Ducky asked, because he was awesome at knowing that kind of stuff.

"Yeah, yeah," Tony waved it off. "I just...I'm just having a bad day."

"Well, if you need to talk about it," Ducky invited, and left it at that. That was one of the things Tony really respected about Ducky; he knew when not to push.

"Thanks," he said, and grabbed the report. "I'll take this to Gibbs."

* * *

"It's a wolf," he announced, and Tim made a face. "No, seriously," he said, and dropped the paper copy onto Gibbs' desk. Tim was already pulling up the soft copy on the screens.

When he got back to his desk, Tony unlocked the bottom right drawer, reached in, and touched the small pack of cards taped to the underside of the drawer above it. He debated pulling them out, but that would just be asking for trouble. Knowing the deck was in easy reach was reassuring enough.

"A wolf," Tim breathed. "Seriously?"

"But there were no traces," Ziva objected, looking through Abby's report. Said report was mostly a strongly worded letter about not wasting her time on nothing. "No saliva. No bacteria."

"A guy with wolf weapons?" Tim speculated.

"A werewolf," Tony said wisely. It was beginning to look more and more plausible. Besides, he'd started it; he might as well run with it.

Gibbs walked in, and, well, no. Gibbs _stalked_ in, and said, "We've got another one."

The three exchanged looks, and Tony said quietly, "Oh, goodie."

They grabbed their packs and followed, and Tony couldn't help but miss the weight of the Trumps in his pocket, and wondered if he'd made a mistake in leaving them behind.

* * *

_Flora might never have been the smartest of her siblings, but that had worked to her advantage in some ways. She was never seen as a threat, and never seemed enough of a help for her brothers to vie for her. She wasn't anyone's favorite, but no one truly disliked her, either._

_It meant she could play her own long game from the shadows under the noses of everyone else, which was always the best advantage._

_It also meant that she had been clever enough to set herself up as an heiress, and now she could provide for her son without drawing undue attention by walking through shadows. She didn't know how to deal with children, so she just gave him everything she could. She decorated his room to in the style of Amber, she taught him Thari as a first language, and she tried hard to be a good mother. But in the end, they were of Amber, and young Anthony needed to learn the most important lesson of all: never trust family._

_She explained to him how the universe was governed by Order and Chaos, and that Amber was the only true world. All others were just shadows of it, distorting more the farther they fell. She told him about how they, as the royal blood of Amber, watched over the Pattern that embodied order, and in return were given the power to travel through the shadows._

_She wove stories for him, of his nine uncles and three aunts. He grew up with bedtime stories of Benedict's victories, Random's music, and Julian's hunts. He'd thought they were stories back then, especially when she told him of the missing king and how the Princes struggled over the throne._

_When he turned five, she was called home for Eric's coronation. Finally the infighting was over, and if Eric was needlessly cruel when he blinded and imprisoned the rebel Corwin, well. No one was going to say anything bad about the new Regent, and Corwin did make a good example, at least._

_So the matter of the crown was settled. Flora told her husband that young Tony was going to boarding school, and spirited him away to his proper home. He was last in line for the throne, behind all his uncles, and thus no threat. So he was welcomed and taught, and given the land of the Far Reaches to be Duke over._

_This sounded very grand to young Tony, and he was exceedingly happy with the boggy waste he'd been given. There was an abandoned fort on a small hill in the middle perfect for exploring, and that was all. No one lived there, and the land was not arable. It needed no maintaining, and as such was a perfect puff title for a young lad._

_He learned swordsmanship and politics, mathematics and horsemanship, tracking and logics and sciences. He learned anything anyone could be bothered to teach him because his uncles were the coolest people ever._

_At ten, he was given his own set of Trumps._

_At twelve, he got his own horse._

_At sixteen, he walked the Pattern._

_At eighteen, he went home._

* * *

The only difference between the two bodies were about two hours of life. Number two had died just before dawn.

It wasn't until the third body turned up that they finally caught a break.

They pulled up at an intersection in the middle of nowhere. There was no stoplight, there were no signs, and the road didn't even have lines painted on it. Which was strange, because it was dark and heavy, and looked a little too new for the surrounding area.

And there was their dead body, all right. He was laying in the middle of the road, face down.

"Eugch," Tony said, and Tim pulled a disgusted face. Ziva looked unperturbed, but then, nothing ever perturbed Ziva, so that didn't mean much. Still the man was missing his back, and if anything were perturbing, it would be this.

"I can see his _spine_," Tim said, and it would have been a whine if it were less queasy.

"Right," Gibbs said, popping in out of nowhere to break up the staring. "McGee-"

"Perimeter, yes, Boss," he said, and headed out quickly before anyone tried to get him to do corpse-detail instead.

"Ziva-" Gibbs continued.

"Witnesses, on it," she answered, and headed off.

"DiNozzo," he said, and paused a beat.

Tony stared back mutinously. No. If Gibbs was going to ruin his evening with yet another dead guy, and then make him _touch_ the dead guy, Tony was at least going to have the satisfaction of making Gibbs say it out loud.

"Get to it," Gibbs finished, and walked away.

_Bastard_.

Sometimes, Tony hated this job.

He hoisted the camera, checked it over halfheartedly, and moved towards the corpse. Ugh, he could smell it from here, and the cause of death was apparent, it was _so_ apparent, was this really necessary?

Something was off, and it wasn't his stomach. He was vaguely annoyed, not squeamish. He couldn't tell what was wrong, though, and that was almost worse. It wasn't the victim; Mr. Backless was not the worst body he'd ever seen. Hell, he'd been responsible for more disturbing corpses than this guy. The hairs on his neck were standing up, now, and it smelled...bad. Well, obviously bad, but also wrong. Still, he'd had a date tonight, and this guy was cutting into Tony's social life.

"You aren't as pretty as Ashleigh," he informed the corpse as the coroner's van pulled up behind him. "And I bet you're a lousy dancer." And then he stepped onto the pitch, taking a few strides towards the body, each slower than the last, and when his momentum finally stopped, he realized something was indeed very, very wrong.

"Sorry, sorry!" Jimmy was yelping somewhere in the distance. "The GPS couldn't find this intersection!"

Yeah, no shit. For it to be an intersection, this would have to actually be a _road_.

He started to shout a warning, but his breath was pushed out in a _woosh_. He flung out his arm instead and it was like swimming in treacle; the motion took strength and effort. A lot of strength. A frankly inhuman amount of strength.

"Stop!" he yelled, or tried to. His lungs fought to expand, and his vision was going dark, creeping in at the edges. It wasn't the spots that came from oxygen deprivation. It was slower, deeper, crawling across his eyes like nightfall.

Like a _shadow_.

"Tony?" A voice was calling, and someone was yelling "DiNozzo!" and Gibbs was probably quietly frantic, but Tony really couldn't spare a single second to think about that right now. He closed his eyes, because if he was going blind he'd do it voluntarily first. A small victory, but his childhood had taught him that you took them where you could.

"Um," a small voice nearby exhaled, and Tony blinked and slowly managed to look over his shoulder at Jimmy. The young man was breathing heavily-no, he was breathing hard. And not getting enough air, probably because his lungs couldn't expand enough. Because one of his feet was planted solidly on the blackness.

Tony drew in the deepest breath he could manage, and let it out on a soft but dirty string of curses, starting in English and moving right on through Italian and Spanish, then into Chaosian which slipped to Thari. He could maybe have made it out, by dint of his blood. He could probably have made it the five steps it would take him to get out.

But Jimmy was only mortal, and Jimmy _couldn't_. Not without help.

"Stay," he got out, and forced another breath into his lungs. "Don't move." Another breath. "Just breathe." He tried to lift his left foot, and it fought him every inch of the way.

He would have muttered deprecations, but it turned out you needed breath for that, and Tony needed all of his for living, just now. The path was clinging to his feet, but there was a little bit of stretch if he put all his strength into it. So he did, and he strained his muscles as far as he could, and his foot slowly, ever so slowly, left the ground.

It wasn't enough, though, and his foot was dragged back down to the road as Tony lost the maybe two inches he'd painfully won. He stood there for a second, trying to pant around the invisible iron vice on his ribcage. Strength was obviously not going to work. Time to fight smarter, not harder.

This path was not natural, not to this Earth. It must have come through shadow, and everything about it from the color to the smell screamed Chaos. So, that was obvious enough, and luckily, he had a weapon that worked directly against Chaos. Tony closed his eyes and called up an image of the Pattern.

He fought to keep it in mind as he pulled at his left leg again. It was still difficult, but no more so than walking through quicksand. Well, thicker, so maybe a tarpit? But not warm, so whatever, similes weren't really helping here anyway.

His foot came off the road with a sickening noise, the kind of sucking _sqilsh_ that a body makes when you remove something from a large wet hole in the flesh. Yes, _exactly _like that noise, which was highly disturbing, now that he was thinking about it. He really didn't want to be thinking about it though, so he focused on the Pattern instead, and threw all his weight against the path.

He couldn't build up any momentum because the shadows clung immediately on impact, but it was easier than walking the Pattern, at least. God, he'd hated walking that, and if he never did it again it would be too soon.

Two steps from the edge, and one from Jimmy, but Tony didn't dare stop. Once you'd stopped on the Patten, it was next to impossible to start up again, and Tony could learn. Well, he could if you beat him over the head with a lesson about self-preservation often enough, anyway. Then he finally broke free and out into the world again.

It was like he'd taken off sunglasses; the colors all snapped back into place, and he hadn't realized how dimmed his vision had gone until he had it back. His lungs worked overtime trying to oxygenate his entire body at once, and his ankles ached terribly. The pressure he'd been fighting against was suddenly gone, and he stumbled.

Arms caught him before he could hit the ground. "I'm fine, I'm fine," he gasped as his lungs slowed a little and his heart stopped trying to leave his chest. He still leaned into the nearest body, and a shoulder was shoved under his arm. "Thanks, yeah, I'm fine," he repeated, but either no one was listening or no one believed him. Likely both.

"Anthony, my boy, look here," a voice said firmly, a voice that Tony knew.

So he blinked into the light that was suddenly shining in his eyes and repeated irritably, "No, I am _fine_, I promise."

"Uh," said the person he was leaning on, who was apparently Tim. Oh, hi Tim. Which meant the person supporting him with a shoulder was Ziva, and the one barking questions about a concussion was Gibbs. Good, that was good; the world always made more sense when Gibbs was around. But why did they think he had a concussion when he hadn't even hit his head?

Well, maybe because the last thing to come out of his mouth hadn't been in English, he realized as his vision finally stopped spinning. He'd snapped at Ducky in Thari, hadn't he? Oops.

Time for a distraction. "Jimmy," Tony said, and straightened off of Tim. Ziva also cautiously let go. Tony swung around until he'd managed an aboutface. Jimmy was pale, unnaturally so, and his chest was moving rapidly and shallowly, and that was, yeah, not so good.

"Jimmy, hey," Tony said, drawing himself and trying to look normal. "You're gonna have to calm down and try to take deeper breaths, okay?"

Jimmy didn't even try to nod, but his lungs seemed to moving a little slower and deeper, so that was progress. A mortician, of all people, knows exactly what asphyxiation does to a body, so he probably had fear going for him, which meant adrenalin. That, and the fact that he was only half on the path were probably the only reasons he was even still alive.

Tony glanced up at the sun, then down at his watch. If they didn't get Jimmy out of there soon, he would stop breathing, collapse, and die. If _they _didn't get out of there soon, unimaginable horrors were going to pour down that road from the darkness and eat them all. Well, small mercies; Jimmy would just be eaten; they'd be eaten alive.

No. No, that wouldn't happen. Tony grabbed Jimmy's arm, the one hanging over normal ground, braced them both, and pulled.

Similar to what had happened before, Jimmy's body rose but his foot stayed tuck. Tony applied a bit more strength, but just as before it was an exercise in futility. And, if he put much more stress on Jimmy's leg, the poor kid would be down a leg and still trapped.

Jimmy didn't know the Pattern, and even if Tony drew it for him and explained it, he still wouldn't know it. He didn't have the carnal knowledge of walking the path, didn't have the blight of Order carved into his history or his soul, and he probably couldn't even feel the layers of shadows drifting by, thick in the air.

That thought was strangely depressing, that so many people were so limited. But the problem remained; no one would leave without Jimmy, and anyone who stayed would die. He hated himself a little for thinking even for a second about leaving him there, but Tony'd been taught ruling policy young, and Machiavelli looked an awful lot different from the seat of a throne. He hated it, and himself, but he'd thought it, even if he would never act on it.

It was all or none, like it or not, and Jimmy was part of all. Besides, he kind of liked the kid. Okay, so he was awkward and strange, but they were none of them perfect, and they were a kind of dysfunctional family. Well, more functional than what he was used to, but still.

On the other hand, it scared him, sometimes, what he would do for Tim, or Ziva, or Abby, if they asked it of him or if they needed it. The thought of what he might do for Gibbs was _terrifying._

So he had to do something, or the team would stay, and they would die on the teeth and claws of nightmares. His team. His priority, his family, and he wasn't anywhere near ready to give them up just yet. So Tony finally faced up to what was pretty much their only way out.

Because if Jimmy couldn't get away from the road, then the road would just have to get away from Jimmy.

He sighed. "Sorry," he told the kid in an undertone. "Just hang on, okay? I'll get you out."

The sheer hope and belief pouring out of the kid's face was almost enough to make what he was about to do worth it. Almost.

Everyone was gathered around Jimmy now, pushing in as close as possible while staying the hell away from the dark borderline. It was easy enough to let Gibbs pull him to the side and send him off towards Ducky, waiting a few steps farther along.

Tony meandered in that direction, walking parallel to the blackness, making sure he was close, but not too close.

"How are you feeling?" Ducky asked, watching him closely.

"Oh, I'm great," he answered absently as he took a few more steps, doing the math in his head and steeling himself. This was going to hurt like hell, and if he did it right, he was in for even worse.

"Good," Ducky said, obviously not believing it but unwilling to press. "Do you know what's wrong with Jimmy, then?"

"Yeah." Tony was still in his own head, and didn't think about what was coming out of his mouth. "He's stuck. He hasn't got the blood to get free."

"What-" Ducky stopped, shook his head, and refocused on the matter at hand. "But...you do. Can you get him out?"

"Planning to," Tony answered, and took one more step towards Ducky. Then he turned and set his foot directly on the path. There was a cry of surprise and people yelling his name, and that was really getting old, guys. He ignored them, because he had to focus now and they didn't need to worry about him and really, it _was not helping._

Tony stared into the black caused by the inside of his eyelids, focused on a point left and low, and imagined a bright light. It sparkled and fizzed, and it sputtered, but Tony knew this dance, and he could do stubborn and willful, oh yes he could. So he poured himself into that light, and when it burned as bright as he could manage, he pulled it up, then over, then around. And for the first time in ages, Anthony of Amber took his aspect upon him and shone with the power of his heritage and birthright, and he walked the Pattern once again.

The first step was hard, just like it always had been. But he was Anthony, Prince of Amber, Duke of the Far Reaches, and he'd walked the Pattern twice before. He'd do it again, and hope it would be enough. He hoped he could do it fast enough; evening would fall soon.

The Pattern was not long, though it took some time to walk. It was wide, but the swings of the Veils would not lead him out the other side of the long stretch of black that was anything but a road. It was fortunate that he'd walked this path before; the pattern was etched into his brain, and he could walk it with his eyes closed.

So that's what he did, tracing the route in his mind as his feet landed with surety. He kept his eyes closed to better focus on the mental lines he was creating, but he could feel the shadow leaping up from the ground, grabbing at his ankles to try and drag him down. It was arduous and long, and more difficult to pick up his feet with every step. The Pattern was bad enough, and the shadow tar stuff made it worse.

And then Tony hit the first Veil.

By the time he got to the center, the shadows were higher than his head, dark and twisting around him, trying to get him to stop completely. But Tony clung to his sense of self, and his memories of friends and families, and his birthright. He'd made it twice already. He could make it again. He would, because the alternative was unthinkable.

It would work. It had to.

He hit the final straight, three steps from the center, and gritted his teeth. Going into the last stretch, he breathed in, then out, and consciously relaxed his hands. The nails of his right had bitten deeply enough to leave him bleeding, and his left was holding the hilt of his karabela so tightly he'd have an imprint on his palm for hours.

He let go, and plunged in.

Those three steps took forever. Just like always, the Pattern tried to break him down. Just like always, it succeeded. And just like always, Tony clung to the shards of himself, held hard and tight, lost in his head and his heart and the dark. He clutched onto Ziva's smile, and Abby's hugs, and Tim's laughter. He gathered the pieces of Ducky and Kate to fend off the dark, and it wasn't enough. It hurt, just like always, and he wasn't enough, was never enough. Giving up was seeming like a better idea with every step, because he was tired. He was so tired, and he'd done his best, and really, who could ask for more?

The answer to that swirled with coffee cups and orders, small smiles and wood shavings, and sharp slaps to the back of his head.

He couldn't give up. Giving up would mean letting everyone die. It would mean letting Gibbs down. And that, Tony _would not do._

His foot crashed hard and his eyes snapped open, and he stumbled as the pressure disappeared. He caught himself before he could set so much as a toe off the path, though, and the glowing tracery of the Pattern burned bright gold in his wake.

He'd made it to the center, then. Hot damn.

His back to the people still on the sidelines, he glanced over the shining lines that lay upon the ground. It was breathtaking, and for a moment, the longing for Amber, for _home_, made his heart hurt. But the blackness was still there, so Tony did the only thing he could think to do; he drew his sword, twirled it once to loosen his wrist, twice because the first time hadn't helped, and then he pulled back and drove the blade into the center of the center.

The Pattern shattered, and took the dark path with it.

There was a moment of utter silence, nature unnaturally still, and then Tony asked, still leaning on his sword and facing away, "Jimmy?"

There was another moment, and then a quiet voice croaked, "Um."

"Good," Tony said on an exhale, more breath than voice. He flexed his hand around the hilt, and looked down the curved blade to where the point was stuck deep into the dirt. Huh, those were his boots. His boots, so those must be his feet. But he hadn't put his boots on this morning. For that matter, he hadn't had his sword then, either. When had that happened?

Probably sometime around the second Veil, if he had to guess. It made you question your sense of self, and he'd probably reacted instinctively by grasping at his roots.

"Cool," he murmured. He wasn't thinking anymore, operating mostly on instinct, and instinct sounded a lot like Uncle Julian yelling at him to never ever let his sword go. To lose your sword was death, he'd said, over and over. So Tony tugged the karabela free, and because he wasn't thinking and because it had annoyed Julian so damn much, the hilt flashed over his palm, under, and around out of sheer habit, an elaborate flourish that ended with the blade in its sheath. He'd clean it later.

He turned around to stagger back to his team, but he didn't even manage to be facing the right way before his knees buckled.

No one caught him this time, and his shins hit the ground hard. Tony sat back on his heels, and his mind switched off, so he stared down at his hands.

They were shaking. That was new.

Someone was calling his name now, and poking him in the shoulder. It was annoying. "Stoppit," he managed to slur, but didn't quite get to the _leave me alone _part.

"Tony?" someone said far too loudly and far too close. "You okay?"

That was a stupid question. He wasn't the one who got stuck in the stupid black thing, was he? Well, technically, yes, he _had_, but he'd also gotten out, so ha. Logic. Yay.

Someone was saying his name, calling him Tony, and yes, he remembered, yeah, he was on a shadow, and he was with his team, and he was pretty safe, actually.

That was kind of a new thing for him, but it was, well. Nice.

"What the hell was that?" A familiar voice, Tim, he thought, was demanding. "What just happened?"

Less than nice. Tony's always been shit at the explanations part of this.

"Is that a sword?" Ziva asked, looking down at it.

"Karabela," Tony croaked, because really, that was the easiest question being asked of him right now. "Was a gift."

"Anthony!" And that was Ducky. "Let me through, let me in, let me take a look..."

"Just, just tired, Ducky," Tony said, and shifted his weight as a prelude to standing. Heavy hands landed on either shoulder, and suddenly getting up was far more effort that

it was worth. "'M fine, just. I haven't had to do that in a while." He blinked and looked up, but he could barely make out anyone's face in the dim light. "Wait, what, it's dark! Is it nighttime already? We've gotta get out of here!"

"What?" Gibbs asked from above him, and the weight on his shoulders increased as Tony redoubled his efforts towards getting up.

"The path's gone," Tony said, grabbing one of Gibbs' wrists. He twisted and dropped the other shoulder, and used his grip to drag himself to his feet. "But only from here, only this shadow, and the walls are so thin already, and it may not be dangerous but please can we just _go already_?"

Everyone was looking at him, staring, wondering, and he was looking at Gibbs. He knew that with that whole demonstration Gibbs was probably wondering what had happened, and with Tony standing there in his personal colors, dressed down but armed, he probably was wondering who this man actually was, and where his subordinate had gone.

But Tony was the same as ever, and he needed this. He needed Gibb's trust, yes, that too, but right now he just needed to be anywhere else, and even more, he needed his _team _to be somewhere that wasn't here. He wasn't asking for his boss's trust; that was never his to ask for. Right now he just needed to be able to save these people, and to know his friends weren't in danger.

He opened up and tried to shove all this into his eyes and his face and the set of his shoulders. It wasn't for him; it was for them. For all he was Anthony, Prince of Amber and Duke of the Far Reaches, he was still Special Agent Tony DiNozzo, and right now, he needed his boss to listen to him.

"Fine," Gibbs snapped. "Everyone, let's go."

Tony breathed out, and his shoulders hunched. He'd have to come back here soon, to check out the area and the surrounding shadows and make sure this hadn't left a scar or anything. But that could wait until morning, because if the monsters came tonight, he wasn't in any shape to fight them anyway.

He barely remembered to unbuckle his sword before crawling into the backseat. He held it to his chest like a teddy bear, and between one blink and the next, fell asleep.

Maybe when he woke up, this would just be a bad dream.

* * *

When Tony woke up, he was alone in an empty office. The first thing he did was dig out Flora's Trump.

"Yes, darling?" she answered after a second, yawning.

"Something happened," Tony said, and started pacing. "Some kind of, I don't know, black road. It almost felt like it was made of distorted shadow."

Flora made a face. "Well, I was hoping to avoid this."

"Avoid what?" Tony said, maybe a bit too loudly. "Seriously, what was that thing? I had to walk the Pattern onto it to make it go away!"

She tipped her head. "That worked?" She asked. "Hmm. Might've been a bit extreme, but I suppose..."

"_Extreme?_" Tony threw up his hands. "Yeah, thanks, that's _great_. How are you dealing with it, then?"

"I'm not," Flora replied flatly, tossing her gorgeous hair back over her shoulder. "None of us are. It cuts through all the shadows, straight from Amber to, well. Given what's come up it, we assume it goes right back to the Courts."

Tony slumped, all the fight going out of him. He fell back into his chair. "That's what I figured. So. We're screwed then."

"Mmm," she hummed in agreement, and sighed. Tony finally looked at her properly, noticing the little tells of exhaustion. Not bags or wrinkles, because the shadows would still lie for them, but the slight tremor in her hands and the darting eyes.

"You're worried," he realized, stunned. "You really think this is a threat."

She didn't quite nod, but it was close enough to be confirmation. "We have hordes of Chaos beasts marching upon Amber, tearing apart the shadows as they cross them. Eric's tired, and not thinking very straight. Corwin's still missing, and there are still rumors. It's not a good time to be here."

"Oh," he said. "I. I hadn't realized it was that bad."

"I know," she responded. "I know you think I don't care, but I have always done my best to look out for you."

He looked away, then said quietly, "I know."

There was an awkward moment of silence, then Tony shuffled his feet. "You, uh, wanna come through? Spend some time in New York, get away from imminent death and doom?"

She sighed. "That sounds lovely," she said, but it was wistful, and that was all the answer he needed.

"Right," he said. "Well." They stared at each other for a second longer, and then Tony cleared his throat again. "Watch your back. And if you need me..."

Her painted lips curled up, the smile small but real, and it made her gorgeous. "I'll call," she promised. Her arm moved in a familiar gesture, and the connection cut off.

Tony stayed in his chair, and blinked. "Wow," he muttered to himself. "How very _Labyrinth_." Then he shook it off and stood, checking his appearance over quickly. "At least I wasn't Jennifer Connelly."

He went over to the door, and sure enough, everyone was still there. He couldn't have been asleep for more than an hour or two, and he still ached a little.

Jimmy was sitting in a chair stolen from another desk, and Ducky was standing beside him, looking worried and fussing. Gibbs was leaning against a wall, presiding over the group, and Abby was nowhere to be found. Ziva was leaning back in her chair, and Tim was frowning as he typed something, probably his report. All their reports would have be carefully worded masterpieces of creative writing that would likely basically said a wolf did it. Tony would probably spend a happy paragraph dwelling on the possibilities of lycanthropes, and no one would mentioned roads-that-weren't or swords.

Tony started to open his mouth, but he wasn't sure what he'd say. Luckily, Ziva spotted him first.

"Tony!" she said, and everyone's heads whipped around. Well, too late to back out now. "Are you okay?"

"What happened?" Tim wanted to know. "What was that?"

Tony sighed, but first things first. "Jimmy, you feeling okay?"

"Not really," the young man said, all huddled in on himself. "I still feel...dark."

"I don't know what's wrong," Ducky admitted.

"Here," Abby said, appearing. "Hug Bert; he'll make it better."

Jimmy took the hippo and clutched it tightly to his chest. It let out one long tenuous fart that petered out. He was still shaking minutely.

"Here," Tony said. He brought the Pattern back into mind, and pushed on Jimmy's forehead, then over his heart, mentally shoving the Pattern forward and into him. Jimmy gasped, and Tony stepped back and opened his eyes. "Better?"

"Oh, much!" Jimmy exclaimed. "Thanks! And, uh, thanks for, you know, making that...go away."

"What was it?" Ziva repeated Tim's question. "And how did you make it go away?"

"It's a family thing," Tony answered, then made a face. "Okay, so, uh. Mostly there are two main forces at work in the universe, Chaos and Order. If you know the right way and you travel far enough, you can get to the physical manifestations of them; the Courts of Chaos and the city of Amber. The black path was of Chaos, so it could be defeated by the, uh, embodiment of Amber. That's the thing I was following; it's called the Pattern."

"This sounds like some sort of fantasy novel," Tim said, a little dazed.

"Yeah, I know it sounds crazy, but it's true," Tony said, and collapsed back into his chair. "You saw what that path-thing did."

"So, then, you're from this Amber?" Ziva asked carefully.

"Well. Yes, I suppose," Tony hedged. "My mother was of there, and my father from upstate New York. I did spend a little time there growing up."

"I've heard of it," Abby said, completely out of the blue. "There was a group-they had this journal, but they were insane, but there was this bit..." Tony titled his head in curiosity, and everyone else tilted theirs in confusion. "How many miles to Amber?/None, I say, and all..."

"Well, yeah," Tony said. "All roads lead to Amber, if you walk long enough. Sounds like Corwin's work; he was always the most poetic."

Abby started at the name. "Yeah, that was in the journal! It was, um," she frowned in thought. "Something about 'The Archangel Corwin' passing before the storm, 'lightning upon his breast.' And that when asked where he was going, he'd say, 'To the ends of the Earth,' or something like that."

"Yeah," Tony sighed. "My uncles do tend to have a problem with melodrama."

"Good thing you didn't get that," Tim drawled, and Tony stuck out his tongue. Hey, if they were making jokes, everything'd be all right.

"Yes, it certainly is a good thing that I'm a mature realist not prone to melodrama," Tony deadpanned, and even Jimmy managed a smile at that.

It also earned him a headslap. "Ow! Boss, what was that for?"

Gibbs pushed off the wall. "Being stupid," he answered. "Get some sleep. Tomorrow you're gonna do whatever it takes to stop dead bodies from showing up on our lawn. Got it?"

"Yes, Boss," Tony nodded. That he could do, and the rush of relief that he hadn't lost anyone's friendship or trust was dizzying. Then he surprised himself by yawning widely.

Tim followed, and Abby a second later.

"I wanna hear all about this magical Order place," Abby said, stretching her arms above her head. "I mean, why Order and Chaos?"

"Dunno," Tony answered, shoving stuff into his bag. "I didn't pick it; the unicorn did."

Tim's face split in an unholy grin. "Your patron is a _unicorn_?" Even Ziva was smiling.

"Hey," Tony said, standing up straight and leveling an accusing finger. "First person to make a virgin joke gets superglue on their keyboard!"

Tim was sniggering, Jimmy was giggling, and Abby smiled a small mysterious smile. Tony looked around at Ducky and Ziva and Gibbs, and finally felt at home.

* * *

_..._  
_end_

_someone make me stop the ncis crossovers i don't even know i can't help it  
_


End file.
